jersey,newyorkandother hard-hit states as well. but look forward to working with all of you to enable us to recover and rebuild a cell is better protect ourselves from future storms that are likely to come our way. thanks. >> thank you very much, senator. senator cardin. >> thank you, madam chair. let me ask my entire statement be included in the record. thank you so much not just for convening this hearing, but for your leadership in dealing with these issues, but for your leadership in dealing with these issues to the needs of the communities and individuals who issues to the needs of the communities and individuals who impact did by the severe weather events, but your leadership in directing this committee to look at race in which we can make our communities less vulnerable. sandy was a devastating storm. 80 lives were lost as a result of the storm. seven in the state of maryland. 8 million people in the united states for some time were without power as a result of sandy. maryland feared much better than our surrounding states. we spent a lot of our resources to help friends in new

and we just offer you our best in this affair. mr. jim keane has been the state director ofthenewyorksmallbusiness development and are now part since 1994. he oversees 23 regional centers, 35 outreach centers that serve 35,000 small businesses each year. all of your experience, mr. king, will most certainly be called on it tested for the job ahead of you. mr. kevin law is one of the most respected business organizations in new york. the long island economy is made up of over 100,000 businesses, 90% complete 20 people or less. bit with look forward to hearing directly from you about what your business is their same come, many struggling to recover and how we can be as helpful as possible. mayor, let us start with you and again, hearts go out to the people that you've lost and are devastated, but were going to stay with you for the long haul, long road ahead. [inaudible] >> make sure your buttons are pressed and you speak directly into the mic. >> good morning, chairwoman landrieu and committee members. it's an honor to be here today. i am the mayor of hoboken, new jersey. hoboken is

to los angelesandnewyork, butit was first important to gettonewyorkfirst.>> host: he starts at columbia. his first night in new york city -- where did he spend a? >> guest: is very dubious about this in my book, but he -- he couldn't get into his apartment. he couldn't get the key of the sublet of the front of his mother's. so he slept outside of his suitcase. he said he had called and came over there the next morning. >> host: genevieve makes the scene in new york city. who is that? >> guest: genevieve cook is an australian who's mother had a second marriage to a notable american, so the family kind of had american ties. she came to new york city and met barack obama after he graduated columbia. they had a lot in common from the moment they met. they both had indonesian connections. the father and mother had lived in indonesia. he was a diplomat. and so she had lived there. her family was in the upper crust. and so she and barry both have this connection -- the indonesian connections as well. [inaudible] a fabulous researcher at "the washington post" and gabriel banks. even

. no more.thenewyorktimestoday wrote about that as a fallback position. would you support that? >> adelle want to feed into this to stay apocalyptic. i'm on his accountant there enough people, a majority of people in this town and understand that what they're playing chicken with is the most important country in the world. we on the bridge of -- before it talk about fiscal, we are here because of the last fiscal cliff that created a scenario that led to this ridiculous idea that i voted against. let's put a bunch of bad things to happen at one time because that will force washington to do something. we have to avoid doing damage. avoid doing harm. we need to look for a way to accomplish that in the short term. and then we have to have a conversation but getting the fiscal house in order. it's fundamentally true. we spend a trillion dollars a year more than we taken. we have to address it. i approach this issue with the belief the only way with me that in order is to rapid economic order. what the president is proposing does not raise enough revenue to make a significant dent in

with their all critically important with those communities that have been destroyed. not as hardasnewyork-- tojersey are connecticut those that are much broader but if you live then the eastern shore a community one-third of the population is below the poverty level, your home's have been destroyed. you're looking for your government to help you. this community needs a federal partnership. it in apple asia just about every home lost power. 3,000 trees came down 30 inches of heavy snow fell down in a short period of time. they both need help and i appreciate this hearing to see how the programs could be effectively brought into play broke the two counties maybe separated but the economies are dependent on small-business. that is where people work for pro 3-1/2 to focus on how to get back on their feet to have progress that has been so disrupted because of sandy. also the sure the bond of all that was increased from 2 million up of 5 million successfully helped to create jobs and do with of problem a procurement due to the surety bond limits. also address that in the supplemental. the also

. no early votinginnewjerseyandnewyork, thestates hardest hit so you had the week before, in other states you might have -- in north carolina significant number of the electorate already voted. so in both states ex-if if you cast a provisional ballot, it doesn't count at all. fortunately the state at the last minute had executive orders that opened that up. but how much education they were able get to out when people were just trying to unbury their lives and didn't have electricity and power. so allowing people who cast provisional ballots would have provided more flexibility, understanding ahead of time so people knew they could have gone to another precinct and voted and haste count. we want people to have their ballots counted but it wasn't able to get back to that location, so look at ways to expand the ability of people to vote and other options. expanding the way you vote permanently and looking how you inform people about the polling locations and ways -- text-messaging, or other -- that clearly broke down. >> for me, the problem with the electoral college. my job is to get

lewis back on stage. he's currently contribute letter to"thenewyorktimes"magazine and "national geographic" and correspondent for gq. previous books include desert, biography of george w. bush, comprehensive history ruins the magazine and a novel. robert is a native of houston attended university of texas at austin. please join me in welcoming robert draper. [applause] >> nice to see you. i thought we might start broad. are we better off than they were two years ago? [laughter] >> i really have to answer that question. it really needs answering quite >> it does. >> unit of measurement the democrats would use for congress' performance are different from that which the republicans use. as speaker john boehner has said over and over, the second pass a record low number of those pixel of the congress that were not imposing regulations and not increasing taxes. that's way one of looking on it. the way most people look at it attested to by record low popularity approval rating is that this is a congress that has been defined by dysfunction of the law, a congress in which has never bee

. the waste is across the platform. i mean, i think if you -- this week there was an aural in"thenewyorktimes"around fraud. fraud and some of the activities going on in that area. so fraud is a component of that. but for us as an organization, the largest waste is the lack of integrated care. and we what that means is duplication of services and where people are in the wrong aspect of that. you're shaking your head so must mott be answering your question. [inaudible] >> thank you for a talk which demonstrates one of the things that i find very encouraging about this affordable care act that we're now beginning to embrace, and it is exactly the tremendous focus on how it plays out in the market place, and humana is setting itself up as a model player in a complex game that involves lots of bargaining, lots of incentives, rewarding behavior you want. but i am struck, looking back on the last election and the discussion of obamacare, that it seemed to get a bad rap as a quote-unquote government takeover, and it really was conceived of as almost the opposite, an effort to make the private

of the rebellion. one m23 spokesperson recently they did in"thenewyorktimes,"we want more than decentralization. we will federalism. eastern parts of the congress and schuster in eastern africa. even senior ugandan security officials acknowledge this is the aim of the rwandan m23 were pier one officer who was involved in supporting m23 a cooperation with the remains of the state banking day. need to look at south sudan. the subject of us who explains have consistently sought to depict the eastern drc is one single, united, credible front and repeatedly calling the congo a bit like void in the congolese state is fictitious. a federal state for the eastern congo would guarantee rwanda's extensive influence over military, political and cultural aspects of life. the government ever wanted to his great credit to the terrific event for the genocide in 199400 deputed ambition to rebuild his country with unmatched progress. however that same determination has led readers to modestly adopt and destabilize them lunchroom geopolitically strategies for the eastern drc. so if rwanda's geopo

validation of morsi on november november 21st, including"newyorktimes"article which praise the president as an engineer who solves problems quoting president obama. to what extent if any was this at least interpreted by morsi as a green light of international approval for whatever you might decide to do domestically and what lessons should we draw from that experience? 's economics content and process, why now with the united states ruled by president morsi? so let's start with you, mr. cook. >> it seems to me first if you read the constitution, the brotherhood in keeping with its tradition, economic liberals being sequestration of property, nationalization, private property is sacred. that's a direct quote. one would think given the safety is that implementing an imf program would be relatively unproblematic except for the fact politics around the imf. this is after all a moment of national empowerment and dignity. there is a relatively small, but very vocal minority opposed to the imf, that would rather eat dirt and submit to the easiest of easy imf programs. morsi is pulling back from

adviser to the president of the federal reserve bankofnewyork, wherehis work focuses on urban economics. joe has recently co-authored several papers on the fha's risk management and brings a wealth of expertise to the panel. susan wachter is the professional management and release a finance at the wharton school. even more to us, she's an active member of mortgage finance working group, a coalition of housing enhance experts, affordable housing advocates and leading academics the cafÉ regularly to grapple with many challenges in this area. and last but certainly not least on a familiar face, sarah rosen wartell. sir is currently president of the urban and the two, a farmer partly a cofounder of cap as she served for many years as their executive vice president and she's responsible for so much of the work we've done in this housing area. prior to her time at cap, they served as president deputy assistants for economic policy msn adviser to the fha commissioner. she is also an active member of mortgage command working group here moderating our panel today will be nick timiraos

building on park avenueinnewyorkandhe was able to do it because they happened to have the statistics that isolate that one building. do you know what he found? that the average income in that building was $1,167,000 for the year. $1,167,000. the average tax rate of the people in that building was 14.7%. the janitor in that building had an income of $33,000 and he paid a tax rate of 24.9%. is this fair? is it fair that people making $1.1 million paid a tax rate of 14.7% and the janitor who served them, earning $33,000 a year, paid a tax rate of 24.9%? well, i personally don't think so. and i know all the arguments. i've served on the finance committee. i've heard it all. the biggest reason for this differential, by the way, is not the earned income tax rate, which has had almost all of the attention in this national discussion. almost all of the attention has been on the earned income tax rate and raising it from 35% to 39.6%. almost no attention has been paid to the unearned income tax rate on capital gains and dividends. the unearned rate is currently 15%. that's what allows very we

a nuclear bombinnewyorkcityor something like that. it is very compelling. well, the argument is that if you use racial determination for college admissions, it is likely that there will be somewhat more -- somewhat more of unrehearsed, interracial conversations are in especially among students. under the african-american kids and a latino kids who get these preferences -- they will say something to the white kids and asian kids that have overwhelming compelling educational benefits for them. that is a argument that the university of texas is arguing. that is an exception of non-discrimination that the supreme court has recognized. okay? okay. i think that's ridiculous. and, indeed, the reason the court buys this is because there are social sciences out there and scientists who say this is true. now, increasingly, these educational benefits, which, you know, make only marginal improvements to education access, they are disputed. you know, it is increasingly disputed that their are any educational benefits. but i think it is also important for the court to bear in mind, and i t

. >> you've had a pretty -- i shouldn't say you, but there's been a rather --"thenewyorktimes"called the new leaders of china a meritocracy of mediocrity and there's been a lot of talk and a new generation of leaders who haven't necessarily earned their stripes. i'm just wondering your answer to that. >> there is talk about the last 10 years being the last decade were nothing much happened. but you know, if you turn that around a little bit and i admit there's a lot of problems and many things were insulted that they said we can ride in the script now. but it was an amazing tenures nonetheless. but other countries had a 10% growth rate? person instabilities, but other countries manage to build more high-speed rail in the entire world? infrastructure and things like that. so it is easy to say these are linked uninteresting leaders. but when you look at the actual record, it's not that. so i think it's decidedly true the first of all it's hard to understand china in any terms, but if you can't maintain two opposite things happening at once, it's really difficult to understand what's go

arrived back home inwesternnewyorkadisabled veteran. although my friends and family welcome me home, society did not receive me quite as well. while there were certainly tension on the politics of the vietnam war, it was the inaccessibility of my environment that made me feel the least welcome. i returned to a country not ready to receive me as a man who now used a wheelchair. that was the reality of an honors soldier would overcome -- the reality had to overcome until the united states improved laws to protect disabled. it is still a reality in many places overseas, places for a better at disabled citizens will likely travel in the future either for business or pleasure. we must ratify this treaty because protect the disabled and the united states of america and the right thing to do throughout the world. let me just again think senator kerry and senator lugar for their hard work on this treaty and we look forward to our colleagues voting for it in just a short hour from now. yield the floor. >> mr. president, how much time the reigns? >> 27 minutes remaining. >> and how much time